Until about 1,000 years ago, Madagascar was home to fantastical creatures like elephant birds, giant fossas and large-bodied lemurs. Unlike their present-day cousins, they were enormous — bigger than the average…

“What’s going to drive you off this land is hunger,” an official from ICMBio, the Chico Mendes Institute of Biodiversity Conservation, cautioned fishing families and settlers living along the mid-reaches…